Return to Work
Help your employees who are unable to work due to illness to return to work sustainably and up to three times faster.
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Income Care income protection insurance
Is your employee temporarily unable to work? With this group coverage, they’ll have a financial cushion to fall back on if they’re too sick or disabled to work. But that's not all... discover our 360° approach, a comprehensive offer that goes from prevention to return-to-work assistance to keep your employees happy and healthy on the job.
Now more relevant than ever
Employees in Belgium are taking extended sick leave in skyrocketing numbers, and the figures keep rising every year. While our social security system provides a financial safety net, state benefits are quite modest, enough to cover essential living expenses only.
More than just a financial cushion
You'll be providing your staff members with more than a financial cushion. You can enhance the well-being of your staff members with My Mind by AG, and get them back to work safely, successully and sustainably with a custom-designed return-to-work assistance programme in the event of a stress-related mental disorder.
A more competitive salary package
A more competitive salary package
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Why is it so important to have income protection insurance?
An accident, critical illness, stress, burnout, maternity leave... there are multiple reasons to be off work for an extended period.
With Income Care, your staff members will have a monthly replacement income to fall back on if ever they are off on occupational incapacity leave.
State benefits are generally not enough to maintain your staff’s current standard of living.
What purpose does income protection insurance serve?
For staff members on long-term sick leave and no longer earning an income, the social security system provides a financial cushion to fall back on via the Belgian National Institute for Illness-Disability Insurance (INAMI/RIZIV). This safety net is, however, quite modest. In the meantime, they'll still have to keep up with their fixed expenses, such as their mortgage and car insurance payments, in spite of their lower earnings power. With income protection or occupational incapacity insurance, your staff members will be able to maintain their current standard of living.
The social security system only covers a portion of the salary
In the first month of occupational incapacity leave, staff members will still collect 100% of their salary, payable by the employer.
Between the 2nd and the 12th month, the employer generally stops paying their staff for sick leave. Instead of a paycheck, they’ll have to rely on state benefits, which are just 60% of their gross salary.
After one full year, the occupational incapacity will be reclassified as a disability. Staff members will then be entitled to an allowance according to their marital/family status, which is for example just 40% of the gross salary if married or in a registered domestic partnership.
Salary cap and exclusion of other earnings and benefits
When calculating the disability benefit, the INAMI/RIZIV applies a maximum annual salary cap of EUR 56,019.60 or EUR 4,668.30 on a monthly basis (last update: May 2024). The higher the salary, the greater the loss of income.
Anything above this cap, but also other earnings and benefits such as year-end bonuses, performance bonuses, meal vouchers, etc., are excluded from the calculation.
Employees aren't always aware of this salary cap. 2 out of 3 employees overestimate the size of the state benefits they'd be entitled to collect.
Want to check the size of your state benefits yourself? Try our simulation tool.
What's in it for you as an employer?
In addition to being a must-have for your staff members, income protection insurance also offers several interesting benefits for you as an employer:
Barely 1 out of 5 employees in Belgium have occupational incapacity coverage. By offering a group income protection plan, you can differentiate your company and raise your profile as a caring employer, an important attribute for many job seekers in the current market.
Research shows that employees greatly value income protection insurance. This type of coverage gives you a competitive edge in the war for talent.
With Income Care, you’ll help move your company to the top of your candidates’ consideration list and have an extra sweetener to retain your top talent.
What's more, according to our study published in the "Cost of Absenteeisme" whitepaper, the positive emotional environment created by a caring climate can significantly impact how staff members feel and function in their professional lives. In short, working for a caring employer reduces the risk of stress-related absences.
Income Care helps you stand out from the competition.
A variety of tools to help you combat absenteeism
Offering a financial safety net is no longer enough: a holistic approach is what's needed to prevent long-term absenteeism.
As the first market player to include Return to Work assistance in its insurance coverage as of 2017, AG has continued to meet the needs of its customers by also launching prevention services in 2019, now under the name of Waldon:
- My WellRi, a quantitative and scientific assessment of your employees’ general and workplace wellbeing
- My Mind by AG, a range of self-care tools to enhance your employees' mental resilience
In addition, for certain customers (if they can preserve the anonymity of the data), a Return to Work dashboard is available to track the evolution of mental disorders, measure employee satisfaction with the solution, and compare their results with other companies.
Select and customise your income protection insurance
It’s up to you to decide what to include in your income protection plan
Tailored to your company's specific needs
Income Care offers a solution for many employees, but also for you. With this coverage, you can raise your profile as a caring employer. For optimum protection, you determine the scope of coverage yourself, depending on your company's needs.
Select the covers to be included
- incapacity benefit
- waiver of premiums
Set the insured risk
- illness
- non-occupational accident
- occupational accident
Select the incapacity benefit type
- offset
- step-rated
- lump sum
Customise the coverage and select
- the waiting period
- the indexation for benefits
- the maximum annual benefit amount
Want to find out more?
You'll find more details on how Income Care works in this handy guide.
And, of course, you are always welcome to contact us if you have any questions or need individually-tailored advice. Send in your questions about income protection insurance or request a non-binding quote for Income Care, and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can.